A Delicate Balance

by Adrian Gostick

Editorial Associate

Denice and Cassie are teetering on the verge of success in a sport known for its ups and downs.

You take your place in line, rubbing the chalk deeper into your hands. You take a quick glance at your older sister. She is running, jumping, spinning—making difficult gymnastic moves into something beautiful.

“I can do it,” you say to the air.

Then you run at the vault. There is a low crack, a moment of uncertainty as the ground disappears and you begin twisting. I can do it, you repeat. The landing is perfect. You turn and your older sister is watching. You both smile. For a moment anything is possible.

If you’re not 13, try to remember what it was like. Standing in the shadow of an older brother or sister. Wondering who you are. Proving yourself in a big world.

Denice Pauga is 13. She is also one of the best gymnasts her age in Canada, but her sister Cassandra, 16, has always been that little bit better. It has taken a long time, but Denice is beginning to find her own way, in life and at the gym.

In Lethbridge, Alberta, the west wind always blows hard off the plains, twisting and dancing through town. The wind is persistent, like the girls have learned to be. In the quiet city of Lethbridge, Denice and Cassie have found anything is possible.

For Denice, persistence is not a natural quality. Oh, she has talent, lots of it. In fact, when Denice was only two she followed her sister into gymnastics—the routines, the moves, they all came easy to her and it was fun. But getting to a point where she could compete with the best was hard work. Cassie never objected to training long hours, skipping parties, missing her friends. But for Denice it was different.

She complained about having to practice every night. Her dad said she didn’t have to go and for six months Denice played with her friends, instead. No gymnastics.

In the end Denice missed the competition, the limelight, and asked to go back—this time for good. “I think one of the things Denice loves about gymnastics is showing a crowd what she can do,” says Cassie.

And that love of performance is apparent as soon as you meet her. So is her distaste for practice. In a way it is charming, that she cannot fake an attitude. Denice grumbles all the way up to the bars; then she grabs a hold and her eyes focus. She turns professional. She seems to relish each movement that defies physical law—to know that she can do something so wonderful, so fascinating for the people watching.

But even with that love of performance, there have been difficulties. “It’s hard because Cassie is always one step ahead of her,” says Robby, their mom. “What Denice doesn’t realize is that she is actually a better gymnast than Cassie was at her age. But Cassie always gets to move first.”

“I feel competition to do as well as Cassie, but I have realized that I can do some things as good as her,” says Denice. “Some things I can do even better. That makes me feel equal.”

And in time she has found something of her own that has helped—a relationship with her Heavenly Father. “It’s become important in my life. I always pray before a meet and I haven’t been hurt yet. And I know if I stick to the standards of the Church, if I don’t give them up, He will help me out when I need it.”

Cassie was the opposite of Denice. She never wanted to leave gymnastics. “You could put her in the gym at eight o’clock in the morning and come back for her at eight o’clock at night and she’d still be working hard,” says Robby. She loved the practice as much as competing—the thrill of nailing a move that only a handful of girls in the world could make.

But along the way Cassie had her own obstacles to overcome.

In December of ’89, Cassie was coming off a remarkable year. She had placed 13th in Canada her first year as a high performance senior (the highest class of amateur—Denice competes in the Open Class, 13- and 14-year-olds). But then, as she was performing a routine on bars, she slipped and tore ligaments in her back. For the next six months she was in pain, at first barely able to move. She rested, did all the right things, but Canadian nationals came and practice and competition were still painful.

She convinced her coaches and parents to let her compete anyway. The night before the meet, Cassie said a prayer that her back would be better. That morning, as she was warming up, her grandmother came up and said she had been fasting and praying for her, to help her through the competition.

“My back had hurt for all those months. It was hurting all the time. But at that moment it stopped.

“I’d always prayed before a competition, but that was the first time I realized Heavenly Father does answer our prayers, that he is there to help us get through the tough things in life.”

Although she missed most of the year due to her injury, she was able to place 13th again, one spot off the 12-person Canadian international traveling team.

From then on life and gymnastics were different. They meant even more. It was like the Lord was there, always, and it was through him that anything was possible.

Of course, there’s more than the gym in Cassie and Denice’s lives. Cassie attends seminary faithfully, and Denice starts this year. Both girls sing and play instruments. They enjoy attending Young Women. And there are friends and family.

Mom and Grandma take the girls to the gym and travel with them on trips. Little sister, Kirsten, is also in gymnastics, and the older girls enjoy helping her. And there’s Dad. Tony loves his family, but he has found he has his own obstacles. He’s a perfectionist—he admits it. Tony has always been a top athlete and he expects his children to win. So usually he stays away from the meets, not because he doesn’t care, but because he cares so much.

“I’m afraid that my presence will be too much—that they will perform to satisfy me, rather than themselves, and end up making a mistake.

“I’m a very hard person for them to have for a dad. I don’t actually know if they think I’m proud of them. I think Cassie knows.”

They know. Through time Dad has become less of a mystery. “I’m learning to deal with it,” says Denice. “It’s like other problems in life. You just take them one step at a time, just like learning a new move.”

You strive for excellence, but eventually you realize you can’t be perfect in everything you do, everything you try. You just have to do your best and accept that in others.

That includes accepting each other. In training they have put aside sisterly differences and offer encouragement.

“Believe it or not, they train together like friends, not sisters,” says their coach, Dan Niehaus, who supervises the girls’ 25 hours a week of training. “They transmit a good feeling to the younger girls in the gym. They make it a fun place to be.”

As for the future, it is rich with hope like the present, full of challenges and occasional victories. This year both girls are hoping to place well at nationals and realize a life-long dream, to make the Canadian traveling team.

“I think representing my country would be the best,” says Cassie. “Being at an international competition and having a Canada track suit on—the suits are really nice.”

All that seems so far from Lethbridge. But it started here on the southern Alberta plains—with the support of a family and a determination to do their best.

Outside, the prairies seem to stretch on forever. The persistent west wind always blows, twisting and dancing. Cassie and Denice know Lethbridge is a place, like any place, where anything is possible.

Photography by Philip Shurtleff

Denise tries to balance her interests in gymnastics and music. She and her sister sing in a local musical theatre company when they have free time.

Cassie likes helping her younger sister with schoolwork, but independent Kirsten, 7, often says her sisters try to help too much.

Despite rigorous training schedules, Denice and Cassie have to stay on top of class work. Cassie (bottom of page) says seminary is actually interesting, while Denice and her dad say that math is … well … math is one of those things you have to do.